According to web firm Net Applications, the Mac’s market share jumped from 6.8% in November to 7.3% in December. But that’s not all: in the last two days of that month, the Mac’s share rose even higher, to 8.01%.
Net Applications uses a unique method to determine market share. They look at the installed base of internet users and attempt to accurately derive market share numbers based on how many users of each OS hit various websites.
Is it the most precise way of calculating how many Macs, compared to other PCs, were actually purchased? Definitely not. But, realistically, that doesn’t matter. Install base numbers are far more valuable than pure market share — they demonstrate the growing purchasing power of the Mac community. More Mac-using customers means more Mac-based products and services, which is ultimately what we want.
Uh…sorta. Let’s think about this for a second. Do we really need a massive surge of Mac users dominating the web? Not really: not only does it attract the attention of good developers…it also attracts hordes of sucky ones — those who design the legions of crappy Windows apps that flood the market and bury the superior, functional software we’re used to. Not to mention the big “Hack Me!” sign it nails to our door, luring malcontent hax0rs to our front steps.
Hooray for Apple and blah blah etc. Growth is good, for the most part. Let’s just hope the success doesn’t become so dramatic it winds up biting us in the rear.
[via MacRumors]
Awesomely put! I would hate to have all my friends with macbooks and whatever else. The market as it is now is the healthiest. Lots of developers, users, but not too many as in....windows...
Cynical.... veeery cynical.
I'm old enough to know that whatever is loved, preferred, used by a vast majority of a population is usually inferior. And I don't include cases where a better alternative is not affordable: a CD with a simphony of Beethoven costs almost certainly less than the last noisy exploit of some band of drug-addicted freaks (I'm not implying that all modern music is crap!) but very probably the latter one will sell more copies.
Therefore I'd be very worried if Apple should reach a market share higher than, say, 25% for computers. I even fear that a high market share in other sectors, as the iPod has and the iPhone might reach, would change for the worse the company's attitude towards users, as I suspect is happening already.
Sometimes I console myself thinking that I own a garage and with a couple of good friends might start the next.... oh... oh... I'm way too old for that!